AMA Recap with Binance Ukraine
As we kick off the AMA series with Binance local communities, the people of Ukraine are first on the list. With those 8,122 members as of this writing, there are sure a lot of questions that overwhelmed us!
We thank you for all the interest and those wonderful questions. We’ve summarized it for others to read for those who’ve missed it.
Segment 1
Speaker introduction:
Sébastien Borget:
I am Sébastien Borget, COO, co-founder of The Sandbox, which is a decentralized gaming platform (http://sandbox.game). I am also the president of the Blockchain Game Alliance and an advocate for #NFTs & blockchain in games. Nice to meet you all and excited to get started with our very first AMA with the Binance community.
The Sandbox (http://www.sandbox.game) is a virtual world where players can build, own, and monetize their gaming experiences in the Ethereum blockchain using $SAND, the platform’s utility token.
Here’s a teaser to open your appetite :)
* https://youtu.be/oi1mis3DGZE
Ivan Paskar:
Welcome in guys @88garam @sebastienborget! A pleasure to have you here with us today!
Finally the long-awaited IEO on Binance Launchpad!
However, before we start to talk about The Sandbox let’s get to know each other better if you don’t mind :)
Please feel free to introduce yourself.
Sébastien Borget:
Sounds good! So hey my name is Sebastien, I’m 35 years old, living in France, married with 2 kids
My main occupation is being the COO and Co-Founder of The Sandbox, which is a decentralized gaming platform (http://sandbox.game).
I am also the president of the Blockchain Game Alliance and an advocate for #NFTs & blockchain in games. Nice to meet you all!
Garlam WON: Hey guys glad to be here I’ll be mostly observing
Ivan Paskar: Lovely! Bonjour Sebastian! :)
Garlam WON: Also here are the quick stats on myself
- Forbes — https://www.forbes.com/sites/geraldfenech/2018/12/19/interview-garlam-won-a-journey-from-comic-books-to-cryptocurrency-and-beyond/
- Twitter (12k+ followers) — https://twitter.com/GarlamWon
- Linkedin (16k+ followers) — https://www.linkedin.com/in/garlam/
- Head of Marketing for Harmony — https://twitter.com/GarlamWon/status/1186236939692920832?s=20
R/R
- First marketing person at Harmony and developed entire marketing pipeline and infrastructure
- Ran AMA, Influencer, Twitter, Content, PR for Harmony
- 800–70k in twitter following
- Developed content line
- Brought in all the community managers and set up groups for Trading, Main community, and Harmony Fanatics group — Grew community from 3000–12k
- Built relationship with journalists and got featured in Entrepreneur.com, Coindesk, Forbes, Cointelegraph, Reuters, The Block, Wall Street Journal, Hackernoon, etc
- Brought in gov contract (big tech company in Korea, Government incubator, MOU with the city of Seoul) — Confidential
- Led most of the exchange listings (Huobi, Kucoin, Bitmax, Gate.io, Coinone)
Ivan Paskar: Hey hey Garlam! Welcome in :)
Sébastien Borget: We’re ready to get into the first question
Ivan Paskar: Awesome experience @88garam!
We do love Harmony, their presence in CIS countries and hopefully, The Sandbox will follow the same pace!
Exactly boss! Let’s get it started!
Sébastien Borget: Thank you so much for having us here, for our first AMA with Binance community :)
Ivan Paskar: So, I’ve heard that The Sandbox (http://www.sandbox.game) is a virtual world where players can build, own, and monetize their gaming experiences in the Ethereum blockchain using SAND, the platform’s utility token.
Could you please tell us a bit more about the project itself before we get dipper into the technology? 😉
Sébastien Borget: Alright, this is a great starter question — let’s start with the basics :)
At its core, The Sandbox is an ecosystem for Players and Creators, consisting of three main components: a Voxel Editor (named “VoxEdit”), a Marketplace, and the game itself.
These 3 main components are:
- First VOXEDIT: it is a 3D modeling and animating package that allows users to create and animate 3D objects such as people, animals, foliage, and tools.
- Then the MARKETPLACE: it allows users to upload, publish, and sell their ASSETS made in VoxEdit, as Non-Fungible Tokens (Both ERC-721 and ERC-1155 tokens).
- And finally the GAME MAKER: it allows players to build 3D games for free. With the help of pre-assigned behaviors and visual settings, no coding knowledge is required.
We are aiming to open the public beta of the game in December 2020. Players will be able to pre-register, create their avatar, and customize it.
Ivan Paskar: Can’t wait! One of a friend of mine is a 3D artist! Gonna pitch her this opportunity 👌🏻
Sébastien Borget: The first experience is for players to socialize, talk, walk, and interact with each other.
They can explore the lands, use the transport system to travel quickly between lands, or move from one land to an adjacent one using the edges. We are preparing an MMO-RPG inspired gameplay, where players will need to complete quests across the map (kill enemies, collect items, etc), either in lands made by players or in procedurally generated lands.
Players can collect tokens and resources and trade them with other players, creators, artists, etc on the platform. This business model is called play-to-earn, as anything they collect in the game is truly owned by players, they can trade it to other players (inside the marketplace or outside on other websites), transfer it to other players or even resell it through our currency $SAND.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f4_1T6duXic
Ivan Paskar: Nice! The video always helps to feel the idea. Hope so far everything is clear for everyone, so moving on 👍🏻
Sébastien Borget: Yep, hope you like them :)
Ivan Paskar: What are some achievements of the projects and what is next on the roadmap?
Guess this question makes sense since we have not heard about The Sandbox before
Sébastien Borget: I want to mention that we have been for 8 years already in the video game industry!
The Sandbox project has been around since 2012 on mobile platforms and has gathered more than 40 million global installs on mobile, and named best game on the App Store and Google Play Store back in 2012 and 2013.
By the way today you can see our Live Twitch Stream happening right now https://www.pscp.tv/w/cf1pZDFEWkVvSkpyck9HamF8MWVhS2J6bFBuWVJLWCISIiwRFTYARxwl6XmuKRnxfdfR3fKocTwIS0cemxKp?t=23m42s
We’ve been working since July 2018 (2 years ago) on the new version of the game, 3D, multiplayer, multi-platform, and using blockchain technology to offer a virtual world built on the Ethereum blockchain, where players can build, own, and monetize their gaming experiences.
We’ve raised $4.5M USD from reputable investors on our Seed Round, including from Hashed (#1 crypto fund in Korea, True Global Ventures and Square Enix the video game company which makes Final Fantasy or Tomb Raider)
We’ve sold for more than $1,250,000 worth of LANDS (ERC-721 NFTs) over 4 presales, some of them finishing within minutes to a few hours with high demand. The last Presale 4 Round 1 introduced premium lands and assets and sold out 75% in 1 hour for reference on August 4th.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9NN8vM--ilM
We‘ve launched in October 2019 a $2,000,000 USD Game Makers Fund. This Fund will soon be in $SAND and managed by the Foundation, which supports the ecosystem of The Sandbox, offering grants to incentivize high-quality content and game production on the platform.
As of today the Foundation has funded over 15 game projects and granted 100 artists to produce NFTs.
VoxEdit, launched in December 2018 has been downloaded more than 100,000.
Hundreds of artists use it to produce thousands of assets published in our marketplace.
And finally, another great achievement
We have secured over 50 partnerships with award-winning game companies such as Atari, top decentralized games such as Crypto Kitties, major brands such as Shaun the Sheep to build a fun, creative “play-to-earn” Gaming platform, owned and made by players.
Ivan Paskar: HUGE DEAL :D
We are short on time so my next questions is
What is the utility of $SAND tokens? What can I do on the platform with $SAND?
Sébastien Borget: Great question! We’re very excited about the upcoming $SAND IEO on Binance.
In short :)
The Sandbox virtual world lets you PLAY. CREATE. OWN. GOVERN. EARN. Welcome to the Metaverse!
- Video game NFTs: own & sell your game creations
- Staking & Governance: Rewards Flexed biceps
- DeFi & Play2earn
$SAND is the ERC-20 token that will be used all across The Sandbox metaverse.
$SAND is an essential part of The Sandbox platform and we are working on establishing key mechanics that makes it intrinsically tied to the platform and its value.
it will serve for as
1. Medium of exchange:
Players can potentially collect SAND through gameplay, and subsequently spend $SAND to play games, purchase equipment, or customize Avatar characters. Creators can spend SAND to acquire ASSETS and LAND. Artists can spend SAND to upload ASSETS to the Marketplace and buy GEMs for defining item rarity.
2. Governance:
$SAND allows holders to participate in governance decisions. SAND owners can vote themselves or delegate voting rights to other players of their choice.
3. Staking:
Users can stake $SAND tokens to earn rewards, as well as GEMs and CATALYSTs for ASSETS creation.
Also, our fee capture model plays an important role, as a total of 26.5% of all SAND transaction volume goes back into the Foundation.
The role of the Foundation is to support the ecosystem of The Sandbox, offering grants to incentivize the production of high-quality content and games on the platform.
To date, the Foundation has already funded over 15 game projects and granted 100 artists to produce NFTs that will be available at the Public Launch in December 2020.
Ivan Paskar: Bravo! Cooperation is the key to success! Sebastian, I’m wondering what’s the difference between $SAND vs LAND? What are the benefits that the user can get by owning a LAND? I feel that understanding this aspect is one of the crucial.
Sébastien Borget: Thank you! Very good question as well!. As I was mentioning earlier, we have made over $1,250,000 in revenue through our LAND presales, We have a strong community of LAND owners in our virtual world gaming platform.
So, to summarize, $SAND is a fungible (ERC-20) utility token that serves as the basis for all transactions within The Sandbox, plus governance and staking — as mentioned right before
LAND is a non-fungible (ERC-721) #NFT that represents a digital piece of real estate in The Sandbox metaverse. There is a limited number of LANDS, 166,464 in total, each with a unique location.
You can browse our map here: http://sandbox.game/map
Players can own, create, and publish game experiences on their LAND. The game can be accessed through a virtual map where the locations of LANDs and proximity to larger Estates and key positions will play a role in the gameplay, economy, and visibility of games.
Ivan Paskar: Sneak peek! Hell yeah 👏🏻
Sébastien Borget: Players can combine LANDS into a larger shared space to create a richer, larger gaming or social experience.
LAND will have the capability to be rented out to other players (Earning $SAND), and owners can invite other creators into their LAND to help create an experience collaboratively.
So in short, you can buy LAND with $SAND — and monetize this virtual estate by creating games or renting it out to earn $SAND or stake $SAND in it to earn rewards
Ivan Paskar: Sounds like a real estate deal of 21st century 😁
Actually it’s super exciting and I would ask you more questions. However, let’s see what the community has prepared for you :)
Sébastien Borget: Yes, this is part of building the interoperable metaverse
Ivan Paskar: I am more than sure that you can get more interesting questions :)
Sébastien Borget: https://cointelegraph.com/news/flying-hot-off-the-shelves-virtual-land-based-on-blockchain
I’m hot for more questions 👊😋
Segment 2
Here are more Selected Questions from the Community
Question 1
Hello. Two questions about the gaming industry and monopolistic competitors:
Question 1.1 — In France, there is also a gaming project — Ultra. Yes, I understand that these are different types of games, but I wonder if you know them and plan to cooperate in the future because only by joining forces you can bring decentralization into the world of games and defeat the monopolists?
Question 1.2 — What is your plan if the world leaders of the gaming industry start working on blockchain games of this type and become competitors in the nearest future?
Answer 1.1
I am very familiar with Ultra. It is a PC game distribution platform. for downloading existing PC games. They are also a member of the Blockchain Game Alliance, which I am the president of. We often talk with Nicolas Gilot, the CEO. I am supporting what they are building and yes we are collaboratively working on bringing more adoption of blockchain technology, as we are both board members of the Blockchain Game Alliance. The Sandbox is more of a virtual world and game-making platform, where you can make your own games, Avatar and explore a map. We are turning players into Makers. We will explore the opportunities of a more direct collaboration of our mutual platforms for sure
Answer 1.2 The Sandbox has more than 50 partnerships, and among them, we have renowned IPs such as ATARI, who will recreate their games Roller Coaster Tycoon, Asteroids and Pong that will populate several ESTATEs across the metaverse they will also create a theme-park like a universe based on a variety of their game titles.
We can also count on partners like Square Enix (with their valuable portfolio of IP, including Final Fantasy, Dragon Quest, Tomb Raider, and many others) that participated in an investment round into The Sandbox last year.
The Sandbox is a pioneer in the space of blockchain gaming, NFTs, and true digital ownership, and we are thrilled to have Atari, Square Enix, and more major IPs to be announced soon, who will collaborate and publish games on our platform.
So yes, partnering with content companies to onboard well-known IPs is part of our current community growth strategies of The Sandbox.
We are discussing with even bigger gaming companies, but I cannot yet disclose their names :) Stay tuned!
Question 2
I read about your project and was impressed by the idea. I think to attract users and develop the ecosystem, after launching the Sandbox game, you should work with project Theta. They have an excellent crypto platform for video streaming games. Have you considered this possibility?
Answer 2
This is a great suggestion. We have started building a community and viewership with streams twice a week (Tuesday/Wednesday and Saturdays). We are streaming live right now on http://twitch.tv/thesandboxgame
We have also begun experimenting with crypto streaming platforms such as Theta.tv and Dlive, so you can find The Sandbox there.
Question 3.1
What is the main difference from Minecraft?
Question 3.2
Will we be able to walk the map all over the earth or will this process be a purely teleportation system between games? Will Sandbox become an open digital world?
Answer 3.1
Minecraft is not a game maker, but more of a crafting game. We are aiming to disrupt the existing game makers like Minecraft and Roblox by providing creators true ownership of their creations as non-fungible tokens (NFTs) and rewarding their participation with our utility token — SAND.
Minecraft is a centralized walled garden, anything you create is actually not yours and you cannot trade or monetize it the way you want.
In our whitepaper (http://www.sandbox.game/The_Sandbox_Whitepaper_2020.pdf), you can see this comparison table
Answer 3.2
Players will arrive directly within worlds through spawn points and portals. They will be able to move to adjacent LANDS and use transportation portals to allow fast-travel between distant LANDs. Portals will allow visitors to easily explore the game experiences in their LAND — similar to the benefit of having a subway station next to your place of business.
You can read more here https://medium.com/sandbox-game/introducing-the-sandbox-transportation-system-3f03bdab1059
Question 4
Will there be consequences for landowners who do not create any content on their territory (LAND) and is there a rating system in this game and if so, what does this progress lead to or how does it reward players?
Answer 4
We think we should provide a system that rewards both LAND ownerships and incentives positively value creation by building games and gaming experiences on top of these LANDS. If you stake SAND in your LAND and Players play your game, your LAND can generate more resources (tokens, Gems, catalysts) that players can come to collect, and hence you can monetize more your LAND. Also, the value of your LAND will increase more likely with the increased traffic it will have.
The Sandbox endeavors to build an ecosystem where interests are aligned between all the users — players, creators, landowners, curators, $SAND investors, etc. — who contribute to it.
Question 5
How will you protect the game accounts, data, and user tokens? Recently my Steam was hacked and someone has stolen all items in CS Go.
Answer 5
We are embracing decentralization, meaning that your game items on your game account are actually entirely yours and sit in your wallets. They cannot be taken away from you as long as you keep your wallet secure (your wallet, your private keys as they say).
All the game assets (ERC-721 and ERC-1155) are tokenized as NFTs that are truly digitally owned by the creators and players.
Question 6
The concept of the relevance of subjects is not very clear. Why do people have to buy items that are created in the game? What can be done with them? Are they just cosmetic items for jewelry, or will they still be items that can kill monsters, or go through a dungeon? Such kind of donated items. But in this case, the game will have a paid concept that would win.
Answer 6
There are several types of users in The Sandbox:
A. Players
B. Creators (making ASSETS and GAMES)
C. LAND Owners
D. SAND holders
I think the best way to reply to this question is to explain how each group can earn $SAND. There are many ways in which users can monetize their time on the platform, by:
- Selling ASSETS: Users can create and sell ASSETS as NFTs on the marketplace
- Owning a LAND: Buy a LAND in one of the LAND sales. Players can then either rent them or populate them with content to increase the LAND’s value.
- Building Games on the Game Maker: Creators can build and monetize games using the Game Maker on the LANDs that are owned by players.
- Playing and participating in the game: In the Game, not only can creators profit from their creations, players can play-to-earn by collecting resources, rewards, and tokens.
So Game Creators buy ASSETS to make Games. Players buy outfits and equipment for their Avatar to play games (made by the Creators).
Question 7
How can you be sure that there will be more than 1000 games on your platform in Q1 2022? And if all goes wrong, what steps will you take? If there are more than 1000 games and at least 5 players in each of them, then the Ethereum network will definitely not cope, not to mention the more widespread use of your platform, how will you solve this problem?
Answer 7
We have already sold to for over 23% of our 166,464 LANDS during our LAND presales = > 35,000 LANDS during our LANDS presales. These LANDS owners are eager to make and publish their games for the opening of the platform
We have launched the Game Maker Alpha last month and are very close to our community of Creators. We are following their projects with the Foundation and the Game Makers Fund
In 2 years, we are sure there will be many games on the platform. On the previous The Sandbox, we had over 70M (70,000,000 games made!)
About scalability, Ethereum blockchain is used to prove the ownership of the games and assets, but when you are in the game, you are not interacting with the blockchain
So there is no direct relationship between the number of games, number of players and number of blockchain transactions
Question 8
Here’s the Final Question! Will the visualization and design improve or it is going to be the same (like Minecraft)? In 2020, there are innovative technologies that your development may not find a place, as people play with products created by other giants in the game industry, does it make sense in how do you want to engage the community?
Answer 8
The Final Question! Yes, I am glad you’re asking. The current builds are in the alpha stage and we will be launching the public beta in December. We are working to improve the graphics and add visual effects, juice, polish, VFX, and more effects. However, we also have chosen the “voxels” style = 3D pixels, these cubes that look like Digital Legos, because voxels graphics never age. Unlike Second Life or simple geo, which tends to age very bad. In 10 years, we think The Sandbox will keep looking great and fun to play
Ivan Paskar: Thanks a lot, @sebastienborget! Good to hear your detailed answers! Thank you for staying with us for 20 extra minutes!
There will be a lot more AMAs in the coming days, so follow us on Twitter to get the latest updates!
